BeaveRun – a little north of Pittsburgh – May 21st, 2011. It was supposed to rain on us but the day dawned bright and sunny. The drive from Alexandria took about five hours. Woulda been quicker except my GPS, for some crazy reason, took me right through downtown Pittsburgh at the height of rush hour on Friday afternoon. But that was all forgotten by the time I got to the track. We were not scheduled to be on track till afternoon, so, I actually got to sleep a little bit late and got to the track around 10:30. Our first session was to be at 12:50.
I said in the last post that there was to be a new paint job and that some small aero changes were made to the car. Well – it looked – and looks – spectacular. The new paint job is really distinctive, though if you saw last year’s car, you’d still recognize it. We reversed the red, black and took off all the silver, and did the pin-striping in bright yellow. James used a brighter red this year and a much glossier paint. The scheme got many oohs and ahs from other teams and passers-by. All kudos go to James – he did a fabulous job.
I got there, got suited up and got in the car to do some adjustments – mirrors, camera, my position in the car. It felt good to be in the car after having missed the first two races at Shenandoah – the first for rain (Saturday), the second because I had some other responsibilities at church that Sunday (Palm Sunday). AJ, Bobby, and James had already made chassis adjustments and AJ was grumping about the time we were going to have on track, the distance that teams had to travel to get here, and the comparatively low turnout – only 16 cars, total. But I was pumped to have a chance to break in the new brakes and get used to the new driving position without a whole lot of traffic on the track.
A good friend from SAE, Scott Klavon and his girlfriend showed up. We got to chat a little before I went on track. Though this is something I do for my own, personal enjoyment, it was really neat to have a friend to share it with. Scott’s an aerospace engineer, but he’s also a car guy, and it was great to be able to show him the car up close and personal, and talk about some of what it’s like to actually drive a race car. Thanks for coming out, Scott!
I went out for the first session – right on time. AJ said he wanted me to take one lap kinda slowly and come in so Bobby could check that everything was OK, no oil leaks, fasteners all tight. Then I needed to do a couple of laps to bed the new brakes. This is essentially just heating them up slowly with some gentle braking at first, then let them cool on the straight, then a little harder braking and so on for a couple of laps. Everything seemed to check out fine and I was learning my way around the track. Then I needed to do about five laps to get heat in the tires, then come in so Bobby and James could bleed them down to the correct hot pressures.
Finally – I was on my own to go out and drive fast. The track is much more challenging than an aerial shot would make you believe. There is more elevation change than it first appears, and the track is a little bumpy in places. At the end of the front straight, when you’re going the fastest of anywhere on the track, you go over a little hump and encounter some bumps as you brake hard for turn one – a fairly sharp left. Turns two, three, and four are pretty fast right handers followed by a dip down to turn five which is a sharper right with light braking just before you reach the turn-in. Turn six is an uphill left leading to an uphill, blind right hander. As soon as you can see the apex you’re hard on the gas going into a slight left and then the back straight. The back straight has a little kink to the right – at the beginning of the session that was a light braking zone but as I got more used to the course it became a place for a little confidence lift, and then eventually it was flat out going to the ten-eleven combo that is an increasing radius, uphill right hand 180 degree turn onto the front straight. This turn took me the whole weekend to figure out. I didn’t ever get really good at it, but I was better after watching the Pro-Avanti drivers do it. Early I was taking it in 2nd gear but that gave me too low revs leading onto the straight, so I eventually started taking it in 1st and that gave me much better acceleration onto the straight. The practice session lasted quite a while and I got in about 20 laps even after the first few. Times got better and I got a lot more confident.
Off track and it was time for a few adjustments. I was leaking some brake fluid into the footbox so we fixed that up. Chatted with the team and with Scott for a short time and then it was time to go out for the qualifier. Nothing spectacular to report about that – I qualified third.
Now it was time for the race. I had a pretty good first three-quarters of the race. It was interrupted for a black flag while they removed one car that had slid into a guardrail. I managed to get to second when a car spun in front of me and was holding my own against Jack in the #7 car. Then on about lap 15 I overcooked it going into turn one, bounced around a bit on the bumps leading into that turn, and Jack was able to get past me. I chased him for several laps and was getting close until I went off into the grass on the left hander. I’m still not sure what I did. I turned in and just somehow got the car pointed too far left and drove right off the track. The only thing I can figure is that the car got light as I crested the hill and perhaps the rear slipped a little. When I got full traction again I think the car was just pointed wrong. Well, I mowed some grass, got back on track and managed to finish third. I did manage to set fast lap for the race and that time held up so I actually got into the record books. Assuming we return to BeaveRun, I know I’ll have my hands full trying to protect that record. There's some video of this race on the way - I have to finish editing it and then I'll put it up somewhere and link to it here.
Sunday was overcast and a bit cooler. After Saturday’s race, AJ, Bobby, and James made some further chassis adjustments (changed the rear anti-roll bar) and adjusted the brake bias more to the rear. They also fixed up the brake fluid leak and we changed the position of the mirrors. When I went out for my practice run it took a while to get up to speed – we had an incident on the track that kept the last turn under yellow for quite a few laps. But I finally put in some hot laps and decided that the roll bar adjustment was an improvement, but the brake bias was not. What pleased me, and I think AJ, the most was that I’m now getting good enough that I can actually feel the differences when we make chassis adjustments. That means that I’ll be a whole lot more help to my team in providing feedback to get the car set up better and better.
The race was fun. I finished second and there were a couple of incidents worth telling. First, about three laps in, Jack was able to draft me down the front straight and pull around me going into the first turn. I was able to stay on his tail for a couple of laps and then did the same to him. Drafting is such a rush. When you get close enough to be in the lead car’s slipstream it’s almost like you get an infusion of additional power and suddenly you’re accelerating up toward his gear-box. The plan is to get that additional “tow” and then pull out and go around on your inertia. It works so well that I almost didn’t pull out quickly enough – I came very close to hitting his left rear tire with my right front. But I didn’t hit him, and I did get the pass done and then led him into turn one. He stayed close to me for several laps trying to get by me at several different points on the track – unsuccessfully. You’ve got to be a gentleman racer, but you also have to protect a lead. Then on about lap seven or eight (you lose track when you’re driving) he tried to draft me and go inside down the back stretch heading into the turn 10-11 complex. Somehow, though, he ended up going off into the grass on the inside and losing control. I saw him coming and lifted in time for him to go shooting across the track in front of me at turn 10 and into the grass on the other side of the track. At that point I knew I had a solid second place finish. Bill, the guy leading the race, had used the time while Jack and I were dicing to open up a big lead. I knew I couldn’t catch him, so I settled into fast but not blistering fast laps to finish the race. All I had to do was keep it on the track to finish second, and that’s what I did.
All in all, a very fun weekend. I think we even convinced AJ that it was worth the longer drive to Pittsburgh. I really hope that we’ll go back next year. I’d like the chance to improve on my lap record.
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